She hasn’t eaten in a week. Don’t get me wrong: She can eat. In fact, she works in a fabulous Lebanese restaurant across the street from our office. She’s just choosing not to eat.
You see, Maddy’s on a hunger strike.
She’s the most recent in a week-by-week relay of awareness-raising citizens who are concerned about the fact that roughly half of all Canadians live in fear of poverty. More to the point, there are somewhere between 10,500 and 15,000 people in BC alone who have no homes. Every 12 days, one homeless Canadian dies.
Scary statistics. But scarier still is the fact that until 1993, Canada had one of the most widely recognized social housing programs in the world. Federally funded and progressive, it was canceled after 20 years of effective support for people marginalized by hard luck or hard times. Since then, support for the most troubled of our fellow citizens has become fragmented. And progressively less effective.
So Maddy’s hunger striking for a new Federal Housing Program. There’ll be a new volunteer every week throughout 2010. Maddy’s the face of week 73. She follows UBC Professor Michael Byers, Vancouver activist David Eby and many others. I wonder who’s going to be number 74… 75… 76… 77….
Learn more about the Homelessness Hunger Strike Relay. They might be on to something here….
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